Mystical Hand
by Scotty77
Summary: Naruto's talk with Jiraiya went a bit differently than it originally did. Now as the student of the Slug Sannin, Naruto will show that he's not one to be messed with. Maturing Naruto! Not a Naruto/Tsunade pairing
1. A Different Path

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.

AN: Okay, new story. I was looking over some stories on this site and came to the conclusion that there weren't many stories where Tsunade took on Naruto after the Sasuke arc. Or maybe I just haven't been looking hard enough.

AN: One more thing. Naruto will eventually mature in this story, and at first it'll seem that Naruto is completely out of character, but, he does that sometimes in the manga and he surprises us with how articulate he can be. But most of the time, he really is an idiot, even if no one has helped him along at all. I think he could be so badass with just a little help. So hope you enjoy the story.

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Chapter One

Tsunade-shishou

"You want me to what?"

She couldn't help but stare at the other blond with a bit of shock and trepidation. She really didn't know what could be going on in that head of his but she could tell just by looking at him that something serious had happened. Whether it was the failure of the mission or something else, she could see that something was different about him. From the look in his eyes to the rigidness in his posture, she knew he was being serious.

"I want you to train me. You're the only one that I really feel that could teach me what I need to know to get to the level I need to be. There's no one else."

She just stared at him for a moment before speaking. "Why is it that you want me to train you, and what do you mean that I'm the only one that can do it?" She wanted to see where he was going with this, even though she had a good feeling about what he meant, she wanted to hear it from him first.

"Like I said, you're the only one who can really train me to my full potential, at least that's what I think. There are very accomplished jounin in the village who could train me as well, but they're already bogged down with either missions or students and would hardly be here all the time. Not to mention that I wouldn't want to try to take away someone's teacher from them."

He took a breath before continuing. "The other reason that I came to you was because you're going to be in the village all the time even if you have business to attend to."

He must have been thinking about this for a while now. He seemed to be serious about this, but she couldn't help but wonder what had brought this on, and what happened to Jiraiya teaching him. It seemed like they were thinking the same thing because before she could ask, he continued on.

"I was excited about learning from the pervert at first, but he wants me to give up on getting Sasuke back. When I told him I wasn't going to give up on something so easily, he stormed out after saying he wasn't going to teach someone who was as big an idiot as me. It hurt for a while, but I thought about it, and the more I thought about it, the more I thought that I wouldn't really learn much under him.

"So far, he hasn't really taught me anything in the three months that I've known him. Sure he showed me the rasengan and let me sign the toad contract, and he didn't even really teach me how to do it mind you, but other than pushing me off a cliff he hasn't taught me anything. All he's done is just peak on women while letting me struggle along with no instruction whatsoever."

She looked at him with wide eyes while he spoke, obviously impressed that he was holding himself so well. It was a side of him she hadn't seen before and it was rather refreshing the see this side of him than the obnoxiously loud and brightly colored person that he usually was. She still wasn't sure whether or not it was enough to- wait... did he say tossed off a cliff?

"What do you mean," she said slowly, her temper rising to dangerous levels, "tossed off of a cliff?"

He could obviously tell that she wasn't happy when she heard that, and with a bit of nervousness that he hadn't shown in this meeting until now, he said, "Well, the pervert wanted me to learn how to use the Kyuubi's chakra. It wasn't something I really wanted to do though, not that I told him that, so he pushed me off a cliff to use it's chakra to summon Gamabunta.

"If I hadn't done that then I probably would've died. The thing is, it has been useful, in my fight with Neji and Garra. When I fought with Sasuke I had to use it to match his use of the curse seal, but, I started to lose control of myself. Not only that, but it hurt to use it. It burned worse than any fire that Sasuke could make and I don't really want to rely on that power alone."

Okay, it was official, she was going to kill Jiraiya for this little stunt the next time she saw him. She looked the boy she liked to think of as a little brother as she thought it over. The more she thought it over, the more she knew that he was right. No matter how powerful Jiraiya was, he was just as lazy, just as perverted, and just as stupid as he was in his early years, no matter how much experience in the field he had, and that's not what Naruto needed right now.

She knew he had potential, an amazing amount of potential if he could master something as hard as the rasengan in a month with little to no instruction. She knew that it would be difficult to teach him her art as he didn't have the control for it, but she was sure with some hard work, okay a lot of hard work, he could easily be at that level. Along with the Kage Bunshin, he really wouldn't have a problem learning all of the book work.

Speaking of Kage Bunshin, she really wished she could use it to fill out her paperwork for her, but, the documents wouldn't really be official if she didn't do it herself. Oh well.

She looked at him for a few moments, thinking this over one more time. Yes, it could work, but only if he was willing to do his part.

"Okay kid, I'm willing to try this, but, you need to be fully committed to this, you need to follow every one of my instructions, do everything I say when I say it with no complaints. We can make this work, but you need to be serious about this, I won't train a slacker."

His eyes widened hugely and he looked like he was going to start yelling in celebration but managed to stop himself in time.

"Thank you Tsunade-sama," he said in a respective tone she hadn't heard from his mouth until now. "I won't disappoint you."

"You better not kid. Meet me at training ground four tomorrow morning at seven sharp. You're my student now, and I don't know whether Kakashi's bad habit of being late has rubbed off on you or not, but know that I won't tolerate anything but the best. I can still decide not to train you if you don't meet my expectations."

He looked at her with nothing but determination and she knew she was making the right decision. As he walked out the door, she couldn't help but think that he had no idea what he was in for.

XxXx

Tsunade, he had found out, taught in a way that Naruto had never been taught before. She basically beat him into the ground with her amazing speed and strength, all the while showing him what he was doing wrong, what she wanted him to do, and how she wanted him to do it.

He had never really had such a hands on teacher before, and while he was bruised and bloodied at the end of every day, he felt it was worth it as he knew something new at the end of each day. When she had showed him that the Kage Bunshin could be used to learn, he almost blew a gasket over the fact that no on had told him before. Instead he used that bit of anger to push himself harder than he had ever pushed himself before.

Before he had gone to ask Tsunade to train him, he hadn't really been sure of what he was going to do. He had no teacher that was willing to teach him, Kakashi didn't count, he was still a bit sore that the man hadn't taught him a damn thing besides how to climb a tree and he knew that the jounin were busy with missions.

He knew that not many people in the village would be willing to train him, and the ones who might already had students of their own to take care of. He had racked his mind for an idea, hoping to come up with something when he had thought back to when he learned the rasengan. He thought about what had happened and couldn't help but wince at the way he had handled it.

Oh it had turned out okay in the end, but if he had some real training, he could've handled the situation so much better. He thought about how much damage he had taken in that fight from just a touch. It had shocked him how much damage a medic could do in battle. It also showed him that he couldn't rely on the Kyuubi to heal any injury that he had, as Kabuto had proven that he could easily block the that power.

If it hadn't been for Tsunade, he would've died. He knew that there was a reason that Tsunade was the Hokage and a Sannin. It meant she knew what she was doing. He knew that if it hadn't been for Tsunade and Shizune, Choji and Neji wouldn't be here right now. He knew that she was the only one who could help him now and to be honest the only one who he really wanted to help him at this point.

If he was going to survive against people like the Akatsuki, he would need more than just rasengan, clones and toads to help him against the various S-rank people that would be coming after him. So when he was cleared to leave the hospital, he summoned up his courage, and requested a meeting with her.

XxXx

He learned more in that first month with Tsunade than in his entire ninja career. She had him summon clones in groups in ten, fifty clones in all and had them work on different things while working with him on his taijutsu and his dodging abilities.

If he was going to be a medic nin, it was something he needed to know how to do. While she basically beat him into the ground, she had the first group of clones work on his terrible chakra control by having them balance themselves on a rushing stream while holding leaves on his forehead.

It was harder than he thought it would be. He had to focus his chakra in two different places, his feet and his head, not to mention trying to keep himself in place on top of the river with nothing but his chakra holding him in place.

Tsunade had told him that he would be working on this until she deemed him ready for the next exercise which she said would be much harder. She wanted him to get to a point where it would be second nature to him before moving on with more advanced techniques.

The other clones were doing something that, to Naruto, was even worse than being beaten down and nearly drowning. They were studying. He knew that if he wanted to advance and learn, it was something he had to do. So, he grit his teeth, sucked it up, and started reading the numerous books that Tsunade said he needed to memorize.

The first thing he learned was that the human body was a disgusting, incredible thing of nature. Sort of like child birth. He learned about the skeletal, muscular, and nervous system first. It had honestly baffled him how it all worked and when he asked Tsunade about it, she just laughed before saying it would all make sense later on.

Halfway through that first month, he was told that he was ready to jump to the next control exercise, which consisted of using his chakra to create strings and attach them to an item of his choosing and try to make it move.

She told him that it was an exercise that puppet users used to manipulate their puppets to do what they did and that it took fairly good control to do it as well as they did. He was getting better at dodging her attacks, seeing as they completely destroyed the training field they used every time.

Tsunade, having spent two weeks working with him on his taijutsu, decided to give him a little test, to see how far along he was coming. Instead of just having him dodge blows or showing him moves, she decided to spar with him. It was to be a straight taijutsu match, no clones, no ninjutsu, just the two of them and their fists. Of course, no matter how you looked at it, Naruto was at a sever disadvantage.

Turns out, all that dodging he had been doing had really paid off, because she wasn't holding anything back. It wasn't long, however, before she managed to get a good it in which had him doubled over in the ground in pain.

She just looked at him with stern eyes before speaking.

"And you want to be the Hokage one day? Pathetic. One hit and you're down for the count. I knew I shouldn't have wasted my time on you."

As she turned to walk away, she heard the familiar sound of shuriken heading her way. She quickly dodged before having to block against rapid kicks and punches before sending him to the ground again.

He stood up, slowly but surely, before getting back into his stance.

"I won't give up. Not even if you manage to break all the bones in my body. I will be the Hokage one day, don't you dare call me pathetic. I don't give a damn if you are my sensei now. I'll prove to you I've got what it takes."

She looked at his battered form before giving a small chuckle.

"That's what I wanted to hear from you brat." She got into her stance once more. "Lets keep going, if you think you can handle it?" she said mockingly.

"You bet I'm ready old lady," he said loudly. A vein popped up on the side of her neck. Oh he was going to pay for that one.

This continued on for some time before they got back to their previous routine, which consisted of either dodging or getting hit.

He still got the tar beat out of him but she was refining the slop that he called taijutsu in her own way. It took the rest of the month before she felt that he had learned enough from the constant reading and chakra practices that she felt he could handle the most basic technique of medical jutsu.

The Shosen Jutsu (Mystical Palm Technique) was the base for almost all of the medical techniques out there. This was the test that Naruto needed to pass. If he could successfully use this technique then that month of training wasn't worthless.

The test was to successfully keep a fish alive with only medical chakra. She observed him as he poured his chakra over the almost dead fish, looking at his subtle but obvious signs of stress. He was giving his all into keeping that fish alive, he knew what he was doing, but she still wasn't sure if he had the control for this type of training.

It hadn't been five minutes before the fish started flopping around and jumped back into the water. Naruto, face sweaty and with obvious signs of exhaustion, looked at her expectantly, waiting for her to say something. She looked at him before speaking.

"Well done brat, you really did it. I can say right now, that I'm proud of you, but you've got a long way to go if you want to be called a decent medic. For now though, take a break, you earned it kid," she said as she got up to tend to the mountain of paper work waiting for her at her desk. "I'll see you in a week and we'll pick up from there."

"Yes Tsunade-sensei, I'll see you then," he said and proceeded to head home for some much deserved rest. He didn't last five minutes before passing out on the bed into a dreamless sleep. His last thoughts were of having Ichiraku ramen when he woke up. It had been far too long since his last bowl.

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R&R


	2. Naruto's Week Off Part 1

Disclaimer: I don't own anything, but i would like to someday.

AN: okay new chapter. This one is just one that leads up to the next and explains a bit of Naruto's history in the story. As you may have noticed, Naruto is a bit ooc in the story. Well, he has had a bit of a change over the past month but he's still a bit goofy and he still loves ramen. Not to mention this is fanfiction so I'll write his character however I damn well please.

Moving on.

The next chapter will be up sooner than this one was. Hopefully. Maybe. We'll see.

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Naruto's Week Off Part 1

XxXx

When he'd woken up that day, it took him a minute to realize that he didn't have any training scheduled for today.

It took him thirty seconds more to realize that in the month he had been training with Tsunade, he hadn't been able to get any ramen from Ichiraku, something, in Naruto's mind, was something that could be considered blasphemous.

So when he realized it had been that long since he'd had it, Naruto quickly put on his clothes while rushing out the door to get to his destination.

Unfortunately for him, getting up so early had now become so ingrained in his mind he didn't even need a clock to wake him up on time anymore. So it was a bit of a shock when he reached the stand only to realize that it wasn't even open yet.

He wasn't sure how long he stood there staring, it was only five minutes really, but in his devastation at having to wait even longer for ramen, he didn't notice the other early risers of the morning coming his way until it was too late.

"GOOD MORNING NARUTO-KUN!"

"..."

"Naruto-kun?"

It was a rather comical sight to see, the young boy that Gai happened to be talking to, passed out from a mild heart attack, laid out on the ground, with Gai, in all of his green glory standing over his limp body yelling about the flames of youth. It just wasn't something you saw every day.

At least not anywhere else in the world. Here, in Konoha, it was something of a common occurrence. And while it was a common occurrence, that didn't stop it from being anything less annoying.

"Will you SHUT UP! It's six in the morning!"

This snapped Gai out of his rant on the poor, but luckily, unconscious Naruto, and set him on his way back to his morning training, leaving the younger of the two in the middle of the street in his pursuit to stoke his flames of youth.

Creepy.

XxXx

A while later, after Naruto had managed to recover from his panic and stress induced state of shock, found him walking around the village, taking in everything the village offered in the morning sunlight.

It really was breathtaking how the village looked bathed in the light of the morning dawn. This is what Naruto loved about the village, no matter how many things had happened to him, this was the reason he got up every morning and this was one of the reasons he wanted to protect the village.

The thing was, there was a time that protecting the village was the last thing he would've wanted to do.

There was a time when he could even say that he hated the village with every fiber of his being, as much as a child can hate something, which is why when fighting Gaara, he knew that he could've easily turned out like that if not for the Sandaime.

It hadn't been the first time he had seen the elderly man, but it was the first time that he had gotten to talk to him. It had been around the time of his sixth year when he learned one of the most important lessons of his young life.

It had been before he had gotten brave enough to stand up for himself, let alone others, and before he had the dream of becoming the Hokage.

He had been a few feet from where it happened, a young child being picked on by older kids for the silliest of reasons. He hadn't really heard why it was going on, but he couldn't really do anything about it, even if he wanted to.

They were bigger and stronger than him right? So as he was getting ready to walk away, he saw the Sandaime come up and diffuse the situation. He spoke to each of the kids that were causing the trouble and they seemed to regret what they did after whatever it was that the Sandaime had explained to them, and apologized.

It wasn't until after they had all run off that the old man had called him over, by name instead of the usual terms such as freak or boy.

He had slowly made his way over, being a bit cautious, even if it was the Hokage, he had learned that lesson once and it was enough.

But he was surprised, the old man was kind to him, spoke to him like he was a person and not something foul, and it settled his nerves enough to speak to him without stuttering.

When asked why he hadn't tried to do anything, he replied that they would've just done the same to him, even if he had tried to help.

He had wanted to but there wasn't anything he felt he could do, he definitely couldn't go to any adults, so he just stood there. He hadn't gotten a reply, so instead he asked his own question.

"Why didn't you punish them? Shouldn't they have gotten in trouble for doing that?"

It was a moment before he spoke again, and when he did, he had a solemn look on his face.

"Sometimes, when people don't understand something, they fear it, as is human nature. When they fear something that's different, they lash out to protect themselves. Sometimes people can't have this fear taken away, but when they can, they will know what they did was wrong. And hopefully, the person will forgive them in time."

He hadn't really understood at the time, but it had made sense when he found out about his tenant. He couldn't help but chuckle at the subtle bit of manipulation the old man had played. It had worked though and Naruto couldn't help but see the village as small kids that didn't understand what he was.

It was getting better though; people were looking at him differently if his walk through the village told him anything. It helped to have the Hokage as a sensei now didn't it?

He looked up to see that it had been at least an hour and a half, which had passed. A rather goofy grin appeared on his face as he raced off to get his daily dose of ramen. It had been far too long since he had his fix.

He received some odd looks as he made his way down the street, but that could've been because of the rather disturbing laugh coming from him, not that he noticed.

XxXx

Tsunade leaned back from the desk as she finished her last bit of paperwork for the day. She sighed in contentment as she looked over the village, the position of the sun signifying that it was still early in the morning.

She could honestly say that she was shocked that she had finished so soon, but maybe that was because she had her mind on other things at the time. Like what she was going to do to Jiraiya and Kakashi when she saw them.

Jiraiya had been outside the village on an errand for the past month and missions had bogged down Kakashi. She really didn't want to get into an argument before a mission so she had left it alone for a while.

Now that he had been given a bit of a reprieve, she was just waiting for an opportunity to confront the man. Jiraiya was another case altogether. She had done some digging, and what she had found out disgusted her greatly.

When she had first laid eyes on the boy she knew that he was the son of the Yondaime that much was obvious to anyone with eyes.

What she had wanted to know was why the boy didn't seem to know anything about his own heritage.

She had found out that Sarutobi had kept his identity a secret from everyone because of the amount of enemies that Minato had made. That had made sense.

What didn't make sense was the fact that Jiraiya, the boys godfather, hadn't done a damn thing to help the boy out in all the years he had been suffering in the village.

Oh, the villagers had never laid a hand on the boy, but it was enough that he was living in poverty, and was refused many resources that were essential to the development of a child.

And while Jiraiya was out of the village taking care of his spy network and performing various missions for the village, he had been in the village often enough to check up on the boy or at least help from the shadows.

He could've made sure that the boy had enough food other than ramen, he could've made sure he had more clothing than that orange nightmare, he could've made sure a lot of things but the thing is he didn't, and she really didn't want to persecute the man without hearing his side of the story.

One thing she was going to do though, was as soon as their training started back up, she would tell the blond who his family was. It was the least she could do for the boy after all that he'd been through and all he'd done for the village so far.

Not to mention the maturity he had shown over the last month. She couldn't help but smile in remembrance at the amount of self control he had shown during their training.

She could easily see the impulses to open his mouth that he had been fighting and how hard it had been for him to not shout or be his usual loud self but he had managed, and for that she couldn't help but feel proud of the little blond nightmare.

He was learning at an amazing rate, that little trick with the Kage Bushin being a god send. The next phase of training would be even more intense than the last was but she knew he'd be able to handle it. Her thoughts were interrupted as she felt a familiar chakra signature outside her window.

She readied herself for a confrontation as she called the ninja inside. She was going to need some sake after this one.

"Hello Jiraiya."

XxXx

As Naruto finished his last bowl of ramen, he heard his name being called. He turned around to see Sakura making her way towards him.

"Naruto, where have you been? I haven't seen you around the village in such a long time."

He rubbed the back of his head sheepishly before answering.

"Well, when you're the Hokage's apprentice you really don't get a say in the matter of when you want to do stuff. Not to mention I've been so out of it I could really only sleep."

She took a seat next to him, looking him over, taking in all of the subtle changes that had happened to him over the past month. He still wore that orange nightmare and he still loved ramen, judging by the stack of bowls that Ayame was carrying away, but it was in the way he carried himself that was different.

He sat a bit straighter, he held his head a bit higher, and he was a bit quieter than he normally was. She might not have ever noticed if she hadn't spent so much time around him. She tuned back into the conversation just as he was finishing his thought.

"... and I thought we could just hang out today. We haven't really seen that much of each other so... what do you say?"

"Hmm, as long as you know this isn't a date, got it?"

"O-of course," he chuckled nervously.

"Okay then. I hadn't had anything planned today anyway," she said as she got up from the stool. "What shall we do first?"

XxXx

"... and that's all I got so far."

She listened absentmindedly as Jiraiya finished his report of what he had discovered so far on the Akatsuki. Turns out, they had a window of opportunity. They wouldn't be coming after Naruto again for another three years. Hopefully enough time to get him up to being able to handle them in combat. She tuned in just in time to hear him say he was about to go do a little 'research'.

_'Not on my watch you pervert.'_

"Hold on Jiraiya, there's something else I wanted to talk to you about."

He paused, one foot out the window.

"And what would that be?"

_'Here we go'_

"I want to know where you've been the past twelve years you were supposed to be taking care of one Uzumaki Naruto and why you've decided to stop his training."

Jiraiya took one look at her face and gulped.

Loudly.

"Um, well..." he was stalling and she knew it. He wasn't going to get out of this one.

"I'm waiting Jiraiya, and you better have a damn good reason or I'll skin you alive and pour salt on your mangled body right where you stand."

_'Oh shit, she's mad'_

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R&R


	3. Tsunade On The War Path

Disclaimer: AN I own nothing and I'll continue to own nothing until the rebels rise up! ... I don't know where that came from.

AN: So this story has finally got a new chapter to it and I'll be trying to update it more quickly than before. Hope you enjoy.

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Tsunade On The War Path

XxXx

"Well? I'm waiting...," she said with a single eyebrow raised.

He took a deep breath before sitting down in the nearby chair.

"Tsunade, what you have to understand is that when Minato died, I was in a horrible place, as was the rest of the village. I took care of the kid with some help from the old man for about two months while the village stabilized from the attack.

When it became apparent that I was needed back on active duty, Sarutobi made the decision to have Naruto use his mother's last name and hide his identity as best we could. I was told that he would be taken care of while I was outside the village on missions, and that there was nothing to really worry about.

Still, I asked Kakashi to keep an eye out on the kid, but he was more messed up about Minato's death than I was. I wasn't really expecting much from him except just to check up on him from time to time. He was busy with ANBU at the time as well. I left the village and it was at least five years before I could get back."

He took a moment to collect his thoughts seeing as Tsunade was listening with rapt attention. He knew he couldn't screw this up.

"When I managed to get back to the village things weren't going the way I was expecting them to. The old man was barely holding his power as Hokage from the council, Kakashi was systematically destroying himself with all the missions he was taking on, and the entire village knew about Naruto's status as a jinchuuriki."

"Wait, are you saying they didn't know before you left?"

He shook his head.

"No they didn't know anything about him other than that he was another orphaned child. They only found out when a certain someone spelled the beans to the civilian council."

"Let me guess, Danzo?"

"Got it in one."

"How the hell did he manage to find out?"

"Apparently he knew that Kushina was the jinchuuriki of the Kyuubi before Naruto and I guess he put two and two together."

"Why did Sarutobi allow Danzo to live after that? That should've been more than enough to get rid of the bastard."

"He was old Tsunade, and he was tired. There was a reason that he gave up the position of Hokage to Minato when he did."

Tsunade just sighed. This was going to be a problem. The old man had let those fools have far too much power, and she could see its affects on the village. The academy mostly taught history and other useless subjects like flower arrangement, when they should be learning about poisons and the like. The merchants were charging ridiculous prices for shinobi in general and giving out discounts, and free stuff left and right to certain people. It was sickening, and she knew she had to do something about it.

"That's not even the worst part."

Oh Kami, her head.

"They somehow managed to take all of the money that Minato and Kushina had saved for their son, which just happened to be a small fortune, and there was nothing Sarutobi could do about it."

…

"WHAT!"

XxXx

"Did you hear that Sakura-chan?"

She turned to him with an odd expression on her face.

"Hear what?"

"Uh, nothing. Must've been the wind or something."

XxXx

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN THEY TOOK ALL THE MONEY?"

"That's what had happened by the time I had gotten back," Jiraiya said shaking in fear in the corner of the room. "Sarutobi tried to stop them, but unless he revealed that Naruto was Minato's son there was nothing he could really do about it."

Tsunade sat back down as she glowered at nothing in particular. She knew that the council had far too much power than what they should have had.

She thought back to when her grandfather and granduncle were the Hokage, they never had problems like this.

This was supposed to be a militaristic village with one head, and yet it seemed her position was nothing more than a joke nowadays.

Well, after this meeting with Jiraiya was over, she would meet with Kakashi and then fix this problem for good.

There was a reason she was the Hokage and if she needed to remind the pompous fools who she called council member of that little fact, then by any means necessary would she do it.

Seeing that she had calmed down a bit, Jiraiya decided to continue with his story. He spoke about how he had set up the fund for Naruto to receive when he had moved into his apartment, about how he had at all times at least one small toad trailing Naruto to make sure he was okay without his knowing.

How he always checked on the kid whenever he was in the village, not that Naruto knew this. And how he was never really going to abandon the kid to his own training, but just let him think on the issue for a month or two.

He had been looking out for the kid, even if no one really knew it. But it still would've been better if he had actually been in Naruto's life so that he would have someone to look up to while growing up.

Luckily, Iruka had managed to fill that role quite nicely so it wasn't as big of a deal at the moment.

He said when he saw the two of them training together, how Naruto was slowly maturing over the course of a month under her tutelage; he knew that he had, quite possibly, lost a pupil.

Apparently, his explanation was good enough for her to leave him alive for the time being. That is until the next time he spied on someone in the hot springs.

With nothing left to really say, Jiraiya made his way towards the now open window, possibly to do the very thing that would cause Tsunade to possibly break every bone in his body, when she stopped him.

"Jiraiya, while he may no longer be your pupil he is still your godson. I expect you to explain all of this to him soon. There's a lot the boy can learn from you that he can't learn from me after all."

He was silent for a moment before snorting.

"That kid really gets to you doesn't he? I'll tell him soon, everything, and hope he isn't too mad."

With that he was gone leaving Tsunade alone with her thoughts.

_'Hmm, should I talk to Kakashi or should I dig up more dirt on the council first before I tear them to shreds,'_ she thought with a wicked grin on her face. _'Council first, Kakashi second. Hope those bastards are ready for the wrath of the Hokage.'_

XxXx

"This was fun Naruto, we should do it again sometime," Sakura said as she started on her way home.

"But we didn't really do anything," he said a bit confused.

She giggled.

"Well we really didn't have to do much, we're friends, and I'm sorry that it took so long for us to get to this point," she said becoming a bit melancholy.

"Sakura..."

"Naruto," she started off, eyes full of unshed tears, "I never got a chance to ask you why you did what you did."

"What do you mean?"

"When you were getting ready to chase after Sasuke, you made that promise. Why did you do that for me?"

"Well," he started off a bit sheepishly, "We're friends, and we're teammates, I know you'd do the same for me wouldn't you?"

"Of course I would!" she stated with vehemence. "But after the way I treated you..."

"Sakura..."

"No, I was horrid to you when we were in the academy, and even when we first became teammates, and I want to apologize to you for that."

He stared at her for a moment before shrugging with a goofy grin plastered on his face.

"Apology accepted Sakura," he said happily.

She was silent for a moment as she looked at him with an odd expression on her face before she spoke.

"Thank you Naruto," she said a smile on her face.

They talked for a few more minutes before Naruto left to get some rest for the next day leaving Sakura on the pathway to her home.

When Naruto was out of sight, she turned around and started to make her way to the Hokage tower, a look of determination on her face.

XxXx

As Tsunade looked on at the faces of the people she called council members she couldn't help but sneer in disgust at some of the things she had managed to unearth, that they had done behind Sarutobi's back while he was still the Hokage, and what they had been doing while she was the Hokage.

Those endless stacks of paperwork that she thought were just mindless bits of work that she had to stamp, actually were well disguised laws and allowances that they were trying to put into effect to slowly take power away from her and anyone in her position.

They had managed to pull the wool over Sarutobi's eyes for so long, because he had gotten tired of his job, and not surprisingly, because he was old. However, in doing so, they had left the one thing no one should ever leave behind.

A paper trail.

And that paper trail led to a horrible amount of evidence of other things that were slowly corrupting the village from the inside out.

Soon enough she had known who had done what and why. She knew who was on whose side and what their main agenda was.

Now, she knew who to put through the grinder and who would be put down for treason. As she began speaking, she could hardly keep the glee out of her voice.

"Honored members of the council, I've called this meeting to let you in on some important news that will affect the village as a whole," Tsunade said as she addressed both the shinobi council and the civilian council.

At that statement, she knew she had their undivided attention, and that all eyes were on her.

"And what is that Hokage-sama?" Danzo said in a rather mocking manner. It didn't bother Tsunade in the least, as the look on his face when the next words came out of her mouth would forever make her laugh out loud.

"You're all my bitches now," and with a snap of her fingers ANBU dropped from the ceiling. The screams of pain were like music to her ears.

XxXx

As Tsunade sat down in her chair, she slowly sipped on some sake as she went over what happened in the last hour in her head. She really didn't want to think on it again but it was something that kept cropping up.

She had managed to, in a short amount of time, get rid of her biggest problems, mainly Danzo and his two cronies, the root organization, and the civilian council, while putting a bit of fear into the shinobi council.

The root problem was slow going, because while they knew where all of the hideouts were, thanks to a few mind techniques used on Danzo, they still had to worry about getting rid of the ninja and the horrible experiments that had taken place there.

Danzo had really surprised everyone when he tried to fight back with his arms full of Sharingan eyes, but his old age was a bit of a determent to him and in the end, he was taken into custody. The things they had managed to pull from that man's mind were shocking to say the least.

He had his hand in almost everything, from how the civilians treated Naruto, to the Uchiha Massacre. She still wasn't sure what to do with news of THAT. Those were just the biggest secrets. Turns out that the civilians really didn't hate the boy as much as they did.

Of course there would have been a bit of lingering hostility and bad feelings for the first few years, which would've faded away over the course of a few years, but this was Danzo. The situation was only exacerbated by the fact that, somehow, Danzo had all of them under an extremely subtle genjutsu that would cause a person's feelings to be blown out of proportion by at least ten times and for the effects to last for as long as he wanted.

It was a complex mix of seals and genjutsu that at the moment she couldn't make heads or tails of. She would have to call Jiraiya to help her with this one.

Apparently, the man wanted Naruto to feel that the only way to escape the hatred and loneliness was through him and in turn, without Naruto knowing it, he would be made into Danzo's weapon- an emotionless killing machine that answered only to him.

Luckily, that didn't happen thanks to Sarutobi and the boys own natural tenacity. Naruto's life was, thanks to this, going to change fairly quickly, but that's not the only thing that's going to change.

What she told the shinobi council members, was that she was going to get rid of that irritating seal placed on all of the branch family members of the Hyuuga clan.

It was more of a problem than the fact that one hand sign could kill her ninja, if someone from the main branch got angry and held it for too long.

The thing slowly caused the brains electrons to shut down over time along with the deterioration of the actual brain.

It was such a slow process that no one really noticed until a branch member was into at least their fifties, which many ninja didn't get to live to.

However, as a medic and Hokage, she had the power to interfere with clan matters because it was such a detriment to the health of her shinobi.

She couldn't really be sure, but she thought she saw the ghost of a smile on Hiashi's face when she told him this news.

What she needed was a distraction.

A knock on the door brought her out of her musings.

"Enter."

The door opened to reveal one Sakura Haruno, who wore an odd look on her face that Tsunade couldn't identify with the raging headache she had.

"Can I help you with something Sakura?"

"Tsunade-sama, please take me on as your second apprentice."

_'Oh my aching head' _she thought as her head landed on her desk with a loud thump. That wasn't what she meant as a distraction.

* * *

Hope you enjoyed!

R&R


	4. REWRITE

I have nothing to say. That is because nothing I do say will give anyone any satisfaction. This story hasn't been updated in almost two years. It's not for the lack of trying either. I tried to write new chapters but it just didn't come out right no matter how I did it. The I looked at the story and was not happy with what was written. This, combined with what has happened in the manga (if you don't read the manga I really suggest that you do) and other factors of life in general have led me to this realization. This story needs to be rewritten. It will be rewritten very soon. The basic premise of the story will not change, however the style and the content will be changed. The rewrite will happen soon and I can only apologize for taking this long to do this. Midterms are this week so it will be up sometime next week if not before. Hopefully you'll still look forward to it and again I apologize for the ludicrous wait. My other stories will be updated soon as well if you read those as well. Oblivion was recently updated and will be updated soon as well.


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